Tag Archives: God’s love

It’s been a long time, but a question I received yesterday in an email from a dear friend and saint in Surrey, B.C., has prompted me to return to this blog, at least for today.

It’s unlikely that many noticed my departure from the blogosphere. It’s more likely that at least a few people noticed my decline in postings on Facebook and Twitter starting February 7. I more or less disappeared. Why? That was the day that my wife received news that she had been diagnosed with melanoma. Coupled to this news was the reality that she was three months pregnant with our third child and experiencing some complications. Then only a couple of weeks later we began noticing that something was “off” with our eldest child — a journey that eventually led to him being diagnosed with a type of epilepsy. There were also other things going on which only piled anxiety, worry, and pain on top of what were already two crumbling minds: financial issues and church issues among them.

We were shattered.

My wife and I completely shut down. We spent days lying on our family room floor in front of the fireplace in tears and filled with crushing anxiety, doubt, and worry. In what felt like an instant, we fell apart and could not see a way forward. I had a few very bad weeks: one of them where I wrestled with quitting my job as a pastor, leaving my faith entirely, and suicide. And another where I just literally shut down, not speaking, almost comatose.

For weeks on end we had doctor appointment after doctor appointment: some for me, some for our son, some for my wife, and some for the baby. We began seeing a counselor every week as well as seeking the counsel of many friends.

Through all of this many of our church family, friends, and immediate family cared for us, tried to encourage us, prayed for us, brought us meals, watched our children, anointed us for healing, and checked in on us to make sure we hadn’t done anything stupid. That in itself was a powerful experience of compassion, care, and love (though at the time it was hard to see).

There are so many more details about the ups and downs of the weeks and months that followed “the news” that I could share. But I should summarize some of the points of the journey and offer a few updates lest you think all is still bad: my eldest son is in good shape and on medication that keeps his epilepsy in check, my wife and I (though not completely free of worry and anxiety) are doing much better, after surgery my wife’s cancer is no more (though we will live with constant check-ups for the rest of her days), and just four weeks ago we welcomed our third child into the world and he’s doing great.

But this is why I return to my blog:

I’m a cryer. Always have been. Even when I had the world convinced in my teen years that I was a bad-ass with an awful attitude, I still couldn’t get up at my younger sister’s baptism and say a few words without choking up. When I got older and eventually became a “preacher,” more often than not my sermons would contain some tears. It never embarrassed me. I never felt like less of a man because I cried. In fact, I had many men and women tell me that I, being the way that I was, gave them permission in their own life to express emotion. Having said that, I’m sure it annoyed some people. In my last church some of the youth would even take bets before I got up to preach, guessing when the tears would come. I was happy to entertain.

But the fact that I cried always puzzled me. I never knew why it came on. And sometimes I’d began to tear up while talking about things that wouldn’t make most “normal” people cry. I even prayed that God would take my tears away so it wouldn’t ever become a distraction and so that I wouldn’t have to always remember to take tissue on the platform with me. But they never went away.

I continued to be the primary teacher in our little church plant while I went through my recent journey of worry, doubt, pain, and anxiety. It was a crazy experience. I’m not sure how many churches have had pastors who get up to preach and include lines like, “I’m not sure that I believe in any of this anymore”? Well ours has. And there was certainly a fair share of tears in those sermons. But over the last few months my tears have gone away while preaching.

So when I received the email yesterday from my friend in B.C., and when in her email she asked, “Do you still get emotional when you preach?” it got me wondering: where have all the tears gone? Why am I not crying like I used to? And these questions began to put together some scrambled thoughts that have been bouncing around in my head for the past few weeks.

This is, I think, what’s happened. I’ve been a hypocrite. Sure, every preacher is. Heck, every Christian is. But for years now I’ve been preaching sermons while never dealing with some known issues in my life. I always assumed that my hidden sin was just that: hidden and out of sight. And here’s where I think some of the tears came from when I was preaching in the past: an overwhelming internal unrealized sense of God’s loving and gracious pursuit of me. I think grace was wrecking me. God’s love was chasing me and trying desperately to show me who I was and who I needed to become. And that internal tension kept manifesting itself through the tears. Preaching of a God of love and grace was like looking in a mirror and seeing all the things for which love and grace were needed…and I didn’t know how to change, handle it, or reconcile it.

Then came the last nine months.

I’m not the type to suggest that God “caused” the circumstances which lead to my being brought to the floor (quite literally). Maybe. Maybe not. But I can certainly say with confidence that he was there in every moment, using the circumstances to teach, guide, transform, and redeem. That’s just who he is. It’s what he does. And these last months have — I know this will sound over-the-top, but it’s true — completely changed me. Both my wife and I have found an intimacy with the voice and person of Jesus Christ that we never knew before. I have stories and a testimony of Jesus’ presence that before I would have thought impossible or even crazy. And as a result of this transformational journey I have died to some destructive things in my life. In my pain, grace and love met me in a way that I could no longer respond to them without allowing the Spirit to do some work in me. In many ways it feels like God has given me the opportunity to be rebuilt. I’ve been stripped bare and brought to nothing, and from there Jesus has put the pieces back together, forming a much better edition than the preceding one.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m still a hypocrite. Jesus has much more to do with me. But for now the tears which told of an internal battle have changed to a dry-eyed confidence, experience, and knowledge of the height, breadth, and depth of God’s love and presence in my life. I can speak of his grace now without feeling like I’m knowingly and without desire to change taking advantage of it. I have no doubt that I’ll still cry from time to time. But I think that the tears will reflect something different now.

If you’ve stumbled across this post, my heart for you is that you’d dive headfirst into God’s love and grace. Sit alone. Open your ears. And ask Jesus to meet with you and reveal to you the inside of your heart. Then let him work. Let the gentle, compassionate, and oh so patient teacher take you on a transformational journey into his heart. And don’t be afraid to let the tears come.

Grace and peace to you.

P.S. If you cry when you preach, please don’t assume it’s for the same reasons. 🙂